Why Aaron Donald Makes Sean McVay’s Job Harder, And Why The Chiefs Are Way Too Quiet

Preseason is over, thankfully. Next stop: Week 1. There will be so many things to preview for the first week of the season, especially the 2026 NFL opener — a Super Bowl rematch between the Patriots and Seahawks on Sept. 9. But I want to take this last week of the offseason to write about the vibes and the processes around the league — just to honor training camp and its conclusion. Let’s talk Chiefs. Let’s talk Rams and Aaron Donald. Let’s talk choice routes. Let’s talk Myles Garrett vs. Micah Parsons. This is Sound Smart, where I try to spin forward, dive deeper, think outside the box and read between the lines. The Los Angeles Rams are a Dream Team. And no, not in the same way that the 2011 Eagles were Vince Young’s “dream team.” That team was talented. But this Rams team is something we haven’t seen since the ‘07 Patriots, the ‘92 Cowboys and the ‘72 Dolphins. It’s really not hyperbolic. Matthew Stafford is fresh off an MVP season. Puka Nacua led the league in receptions and finished second in receiving yards. Davante Adams is the best WR2 in football. Myles Garrett is the best defensive player in the NFL and, debatably, the best football player on the planet. Sean McVay is the best coach in the NFL. And the team just welcomed back defensive tackle Aaron Donald, who’s returning at age 35 after two years in retirement. He is a three-time NFL Defensive Player of the Year, and a first-ballot Hall of Famer. It’s an L.A. team, so let’s make a Hollywood comparison. This is a cast so stacked that only “The Odyssey” can compare. And that’s why this might be McVay’s most difficult task to date. He must win a Super Bowl. This isn’t like the Lions or the Bills or the Ravens — who feel it’s their time. No, this is different. The Rams basically have no choice but to win. If they start the season with, say, three victories, we’ll start talking about a perfect season. And the chatter won’t be premature, even in the NFC West, with the defending Super Bowl champions. If the Rams make the Super Bowl, it will be a question of how badly they beat their opponent — not if they can. And the Rams might have three candidates at the top of the Super Bowl MVP odds — Stafford, Nacua and Garrett — before the opponent’s top option. I think that’s why McVay deflected every question about the partnership between Garrett and Donald in the press conference on Sunday to announce Donald’s return. I think the pressure to win — everything — is why McVay said this. He’s handling his Dream Team with care. “Just because we have great individuals, it doesn’t do s— for us,” McVay said. “We’ve got to be able to put it together. [Donald] understands that as much as anybody.” I spent the weekend at a friend’s wedding. It was special to see the way the ceremony brought the bride and groom so much happiness. And why shouldn’t they be exuberant: They’re perfect for each other. The happy couple decided not to do a honeymoon. The bride is headed right back to school to teach middle schoolers, and the groom will probably be painting boats by Tuesday. And later this week, they’ll be exhausted and they’ll make that pasta dish that they both love so much, in part because they can do it with their eyes closed. And it’ll be business — and work, work, work — as usual. In some ways, that’s what comes next for McVay and Donald. We saw the union on Sunday. We can see there will be no honeymoon. We can see what comes next: work — and the expectation of success. Count me as someone skeptical about the construction of the 2026 Kansas City Chiefs. When the NFL schedule came out, I didn’t think they’d make the playoffs. These days … I don’t know what to think. Of course, I know that it’s dangerous to doubt Patrick Mahomes, even as he makes his way back from an ACL injury. The same is true of Andy Reid, even as he faces criticism for his playcalling growing stale. It’ll burn you to doubt the Chiefs, even in the wake of a season when their offense sputtered and their defense lacked flash. This summer, there haven’t been many hopeful headlines around Kansas City. But for the most part, there has been a real silence around the Chiefs. It’s quiet. This is the silence in a horror movie, right before the villain strikes. You know it’s coming. Still, you jump out of your chair. With the Chiefs, there has been this prevailing thought that their 2024 season, with all its narrow victories, was a bit of a fluke (particularly after the Eagles routed K.C. in the Super Bowl). And so it was a similarly popular idea that the 2025 season was the year when the Chiefs’ luck ran out — and it was also fluky, with bad breaks that made them seem worse than they were. If this were Goldilocks, this season would be just right. But come on — the NFL is not a children’s book. And the small amount of headlines that are coming out of camp are, generally, negative. Veteran tight end Travis Kelce does not look younger. Chiefs left tackle Josh Simmons has a back injury. Chiefs running back Kenneth Walker III, their big splash from free agency, has a foot injury. And receiver Rashee Rice, who is supposed to be the WR1 despite his knee surgery and suspension last season, isn’t exactly getting rave reviews. “His overall résumé speaks for itself. The thing I’m still working on is getting to know the person — seeing the things that make him click. What are the things that inspire him?” Chiefs offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy said last week. “The thing that I love about Rashee is that he’s tough. The other thing that is — and I’m not saying this in a bad way — he’s hardheaded. You know what I mean? And he’s stubborn. Because he feels that he’s good enough at certain things. … Now, it’s just about making sure we can get the continuous reps to get him back on track, to get him in game shape.” Holy red flags, Batman! Whether Bieniemy meant to or not, the OC dropped more than a few backhanded compliments about Rice. Bieniemy clarified that “stubbornness” really isn’t a bad thing for players. He said Walker is also stubborn. “He doesn’t like to be wrong,” Bieniemy said of Walker. “You don’t mind that for player, because it presents a challenge.” Still not exactly a fawning description. But there’s more. “You’ve got to get them to see it from a different point of view,” Bieniemy said. “And when they can see it from a coach’s point of view, now it just opens them up and gets them to realize: ‘There is a better way of doing this.’” Bieniemy was asked if there’s another level for Rice. “I believe there is another level,” he said. “And, of course, he would tell you there’s plenty of levels for him to get to.” Here’s a coach pushing a player’s buttons. Here’s a coach who senses the team isn’t getting enough from a player who should be a star. And so here’s a team that has a disquieting number of questions surrounding its roster. Everything is logically telling me the Chiefs won’t make the playoffs. They can’t possibly! Really, I’m telling you to not be afr—. *jump scare* In the early phase of my career covering football, I was on the New England Patriots’ beat, covering Tom Brady and Bill Belichick. That’s when I learned all about the “option route.” The receiver and quarterback look at what the defense is giving them and let that determine which route the WR will run. Sometimes the receiver will decide a full second into the play. It requires exceptional rapport between QB and WR. It is, essentially, the route that the Patriots used to beat the Rams in Super Bowl LIII. It was Julian Edelman’s route. He racked up 10 catches, 141 yards and eight first downs, largely by running the option route to find slivers of space in a defense that refused to allow any. So it feels somehow fitting that Jared Goff is one of the caretakers of that route in today’s NFL. Back then, he was a young Rams quarterback (on the losing team in that Super Bowl). But he’s now entering his intellectual prime as a veteran Lions QB with many of the same answers Brady had. And star receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown is the guy who runs Edelman’s option route. In Detroit, they gave it a different name, “the choice route.” And according to St. Brown, it’s the route that has produced the most receptions for him and Goff since they joined the Lions in 2021. “It gets us out of a lot of situations,” St. Brown told me. “I can break a lot of different ways. I can do a lot of different things. So it gives us a lot of options.” Break it down in depth? “It’s like around a five-yard route. You can either break in, you can break out, or you can just hook it up. So, depending on the defense — whether it’s man, if it’s inside of you, you can release out and you can break out. If [the defender is] already sitting inside, you want to break out, get the ball on a quick out-route. If it’s zone, any cover-2 type, you sit right in between the flat player [covering the quarter of the field nearest the sideline] and the hook defender [covering the inside quarter of the field over the offensive and defensive line]. The QB can dart you right there, and you can catch a knife for about 10 or so yards. Get lucky, maybe get 15. “If [the defensive back is] playing any type of other man and they blitz, the home run shot is usually the in-breaking route. It doesn’t happen all the time, but when it does come, it usually goes for like 15-, 20-yards, if not a touchdown. But you got to be patient for that one.” This route isn’t for everyone. It’s reserved for an outstanding slot receiver and pocket passer — with a rare connection, like Goff and St. Brown have. “I think we’ve built the chemistry to where, when we snap the ball, like a second into the play, he already knows what I’m doing. I know what I’m gonna do. It’s timing and rhythm. He’s not even thinking about what I’m going to do. He already knows what I’m going to do.” You’d think that this was St. Brown’s favorite route. But — no. “My favorite route is the one that’s going to work,” St. Brown told me. The Buffalo Bills are transparently not the same team as last year. But how much have the new pieces made an impact on the culture? And how much will those new pieces make an impact on the field? Josh Allen is still Josh Allen. Joe Brady is still Joe Brady. And they’re the key pillars that GM Brandon Beane is intent upon building around. They’re more of the same from last year. That’s the old. The new? Beane and Brady traded for Bears receiver DJ Moore, a deal that hasn’t gotten much fanfare when compared to the trades for Jaylen Waddle and A.J. Brown. For all the criticism surrounding Moore’s value on the trade market (and I was one of those skeptical voices), the receiver has been a really good fit with Allen and in Brady’s offense. The schematic fit, of course, is no surprise given that Moore broke out in Brady’s offense in Carolina. But the fit with the quarterback — that’s a new and noteworthy development. Moore’s contributions were regular and immediate in training camp and preseason. His first catch? 33 yards. That’s new. But it’s also a conglomeration of old. The truly new element for Buffalo is on defense. Brady hired defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard, who was on the Denver Broncos’ staff last season. He’s of the Rex Ryan and Mike Pettine schools of defense, running a 3-4 base. That’ll keep all of the Bills’ best players on the field, from pass-rusher Gregory Rousseau to defensive tackle Ed Oliver to cornerback Christian Benford. But it’ll be a change from former head coach Sean McDermott’s 4-3 defense (that largely scrapped that third LB for a nickel corner, Taron Johnson, who left this offseason). It can be hard to make that transition. I also have some questions about how edge Bradley Chubb (viewed as a free-agency overpay) and safety C.J. Gardner-Johnson will hold up — now that they appear to be past their primes. But if this unit looks anything remotely close to the Broncos’ defense from last year, then there will be a lot to like. I’m just not sure the roster looks quite as impressive from a talent standpoint when compared to Denver’s. And Leonhard remains relatively unproven, rising quickly in the pros. Though he’s a former 10-year NFL safety, his first job in the league was as a defensive backs coach and pass-game specialist — in 2024! The Bills landed in the middle of the road at 20 turnovers in 2025. They were 19th in sacks. They’re hoping to see both numbers go up. “We’re going to attack the football,” Leonhard said. “The biggest stat in football is turnovers, so we’re going to be aggressive, we’re going to fly around, we’re going to communicate, we’re going to play well together, but we’re going to cause issues for offense, and we’re going to force them to react to us.” It’s a nice concept. And maybe the defensive leadership shift — and the schematic shift that comes with it — will be enough to put this team over the top. But I’m still not sure about the question I wondered when the team promoted Brady and retained Beane. Did they change enough? Will these alterations land Buffalo in the Super Bowl? That’s really all that matters to the Bills — and to Allen. Two of the league’s biggest game-wreckers, Micah Parsons and Myles Garrett, spent the offseason together. And that made for some pretty fun conversations — including: Who gets more double teams on defense? In the video below, you can see their friendly but tense exchange. Here are the numbers: Double teams, per Next Gen Stats: Parsons: 88 (21.9% of rushes)Garrett: 60 (12.8%) Offensive attention (doubles and chips), per NGS: Garrett: 39.5%Parsons: 37.4% It’s not easy being either guy — even if they make it look easy. But Garrett should have a more pleasant experience in 2026 now that Aaron Donald has come out of retirement.